Retirement living and aged care services provider Arvida Limited has submitted a resource consent application for a retirement village at three neighbouring sites in Wānaka.

The company is proposing a seven-stage development of a “private, gated lifestyle retirement village”, according to the documents submitted.

It would include a club house, cafe, care facility with up to 28 units, up to 165 villas, an indoor pool, pickleball courts, and parks and walking and cycling paths across 8.7-or-so hectares.

“The proposal has been comprehensively and carefully designed by a team of experts in designing, constructing and operating retirement villages in New Zealand,” the application says.

Arvida has 34 ‘communities’ nationwide including Queenstown Country Club, a high-end retirement community with independent living, aged care and specialist dementia care.

Arvida would be Wānaka’s fifth retirement village, following Aspiring Lifestyle Village (which opened in 2010), Alden Elmslie Wānaka Village (formerly owned by Presbyterian Support Otago), Northbrook (now open in Northlake), and Metlifecare (under construction at Three Parks). 

Arvida Wānaka would be located on Riverbank Road.

The sites are zoned lower density suburban residential and retirement villages are provided for as discretionary activities.

However the proposal is listed as a non-complying activity which the applicant said “is required as two of the proposed buildings breach the permitted building height standard”.

The applicant said the retirement village will provide a “relatively substantial” amount of additional housing for the elderly.

“The contribution of housing choice to the elderly is assumed to be significant locally.”

JTB Architects said the retirement village “draws on the character of Central Otago’s rural vernacular, with single storey pavilion style buildings, gabled roof forms, and a palette of schist, timber, and metal cladding”.

QLDC is currently vetting Arvida Limited’s application.

PHOTO: JTB Architects